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'Mamma Mia!' Big-Screen Musical Drains the Fun Out of ABBA

For all its halfhearted stabs at catering to the transatlantic youth market (with a little gift tucked in for the stage show’'s voluminous gay following), Mamma Mia! is a (Shirley) valentine to 50-something we're-not-done-yet broads.

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1994's Muriel's Wedding used the title characterâ€™s obsession with the '70s Swedish quartet's glittery lady-music to underscore Muriel's disconnected idealization of romance, glamour and marriage-centered happiness, an obsession that leaves her struggling to construct a true sense of self. Mamma Mia!, on the other hand, features ABBA as a way to ... sing along to ABBA songs. And dance.

Like those freakish deep-sea creatures living happily in a toxic soup of methane brine miles beneath the water's surface, the cast of Mamma Mia! is unaware they're living in an equally noxious ABBA-rich environment.

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